It's just easier to call her a *****. I tried to explain things, but mostly everyone froze cuz she went way off the rails.Everything that happened is a result of her screwing up with handling Suspiria.

Resurrection is out. According to what Brion told us about the process, brain injuries are no go. I have a few ideas, but we're gonna hold off with those for the time being. It's possible this is a really suck time loop that keeps repeating until Suspiria makes things right with Crest. The other option has something to do with a power that Suspiria used earlier. No hints.

There's a chance Crest's loud screaming will wake her up in addition to the sword working. Or instead of the sword working. I dunno.

i'm kinda reminded of something in Gunerkrigg Court. I mentioned it during the Japan Break? Well there's a scene where the talk about how a man sees a stone, and imagines a woman. Usually this would mean a sculpture, but there is girl whose body is like rock in terms of hardness.

The interesting thing is the story suggests humans imagined her into being in such a way as to predate them, ditto the stars in the sky. But that's a side idea. We do it every day, we take an ordinary girl by all accounts, and she becomes our Dearest. Or a bunch of lumber becomes our dream home.

We went to the UK, and it was awesome. Now it's kinda not. "Multiculturalism."

I guess my point being, it's like we visited a canal in China after college and they had this seaside art, like a mosaic fish. And townsppl be damned they were gonna build a new irrigation system cuz PROGRESS and that area was gonna rise to the point where the sculpture could no longer be seen.

You never know how someone's gona ruin the experience. When you said "hope we get to see it again" I just thought of how some countries I visited, I don't wanna go back cuz big government has tried making stuff homogenized, so there's nothing to see anymore.

We understand. But yeah, the suspense is killer (you just ended with Crest asking the right question, where none of us have any idea what this means). I think Gunnerkrigg Court is also on break. As are my parents for the next week.

Sorry, didn't mean to do the Jewish Mother guilt trip thing. (Rants about how they'd like to see grandchildren)

You guys are missing something key here. Brion's work seems big on symbolic imagery. It's not really religious (I think Brion was on record once saying he doesn't believe in gods, meaning anything from a Buddhist or Taoist mindset, to nontraditional belief, to agnostic, to atheist) so much as a sort of powerful imagery.

There are things in our lives that are immortal. What is the first thing coming to mind? Depression. No matter how many times, it always comes back. People with other difficult to solve disorders like mania or hallucinations probably feel the same.

This is not to say that Crest can solve their problems by therapy. It's saying the same approach works. How do you deal with something immortal? Well for the long term you figure out its source of power. Only something that truly is a deity is self-powered, everything else that is immortal has some Achilles Heel (like they have to feed regularly, or they need people there to remember them, or they're allergic to milk (who knows what movie I'm talking about)). Maybe a final boss type deal, getting rid of the evil thing in our life that won't go away. But for the short term, the solution to such a creature is one of three things: get past it, trap it (sealing is a big option in games like Final Fantasy V), and strip it of its power (the last of these sometimes overlaps with a permanent solution, unless it is able to regain power).

Update: Everyone watch the anime Lost Song. It gives very good insight on what it's like to be immortal.

Okay, Lehm not actually getting true answers is a possibility as well.

What does "demons of the Vorpal Sea" mean? Google doesn't appear to give me anything that makes sense in this context. "Demon of the Sea" was apparently another name for "Moby Dick" (which is a funny reference to flipside btw. XD) and the Vorpal Blade from DnD can decapitate on a crit.

From the points you're making it gets more and more clear that in a comic where you don't know what's actually real, literally anything could be the case.But at least we can stick to the knowledge we got from intermissions, e.g. that an increase in levels means that you don't get more "mana", but your efficiency at using your soul energy increases.

We also learned from time with Lehm that Eye's power (and possibly that of Moss) are not necessarily magic (the thing about the radius actually doing away with magic), since there is a biological aspect to it. Which lends to the idea there may be actual "curses" as well as magic, and these "demons" are messing with things.

Moby, why do you say you're no good at flying magic? You have a flying carpet and you did carry yourself AND Crest in search for Suspiria.Also: Why didn't you bring it with you? Eh, nevermind, the Phalanx in general didn't seem to think about bringing all kinds of magical gadgets with them.

The Pit is actively trying to kill people. Suspiria is making it worse. But notice there's no meat-grinder here. And I'm not convinced she is actively doing this either. Kinda more like when you have a bad mood about getting hired to a company, and sure enough, you wind up doing something to jinx it. Now imagine someone whose negativity causes huge ripples in events.

Well, to be clear, he is a truth specialist, how keep in mind Lehm's power is assumed to be one power level above normal (although it could be more). This means his abilities may or may not reflect actual reality. That is, they may reflect reality only to the limits of his emotions not being in the way, not necessarily recognizing the limits of himself or of reality in general. Or to put it more directly, his observations may be acceptable for basic things like finding a match to his experiments, but may have bias or outright delusion when it comes to reality itself.

For the sake of argument, let's assume he's partially right. From what we seem to have observed so far, there are microscopic organisms which are capable of altering matter mostly by chemical means (and consuming live organisms, based on that Decay spell). It also seems like that demons of the Vorpal Sea thing appears to be more correct than we thought. It's even possible some of these have supernatural abilities, and by extension it seems like they have altered humans in some way. It's possible either of these ideas have some merit, although it seems unlikely that both do. We have heard that there is no evidence that the brain is altered, so it possible that it is (a) an increase in latent magical ability that everyone has, that is the dissolving test actually is just a placebo, making people aware of more and thus able to do more, or (b) it installs some sort of remote control implant which allows the Qualia to receive a stronger signal.

The problem with b is that things like magical efficiency don't really make much sense, nor do much of this scene (why would these critters bother to show up in the bottom of a pit)?

The other option is that it uses a sort of mental energy (similar to PSI or faith), which is internal to the caster. To explain it in simple terms, it's like Flat Earthers. It's possible to awaken to a mind-blowing idea that changes your whole paradigm (dissolves what you believed before). Before, you were like "nah, man, the Earth is round." Suddenly, after you believe the new thing, you may find events reinforce the belief ("I can't see past the horizon", "that plane had to go north to get from US to China", "my friend seems to have dropped off the face of the Earth, maybe it's not my crazy behavior and they actually did"). True or not, paradigm changes create a sort of personal bubble.

Both theories account for the insanity exhibited by high level types that haven't mastered the later dissolving tests. In the one case, the paradigms you believe have no sense of self or reality, meaning you are literally reinforcing crazy ideas (very similar to what seems to be happening to Suspiria) without having a sense of "let's verify this." In the other case, without the proper control device, the mental energy of the person has developed, but the Qualia are not properly in control, and attacking the user's brain (as in actually chewing on her psyche).

Interestingly, qualia literally refers to stuff that is observed as different for everyone. That is, I have no idea whether you are reading the same thing as I'm trying to say. This could well explain why Thin Man believes in Qualia, whereas Melter is talking about her perception of reality. Maybe it is that subjective.

Having tried twice to make my own forum, and failed miserably both times (the forum was made for free, and wasn't attached to any other pages), I can say with certainty... sometimes you just make too many sections. People retain interest in certain topics, and really, this website might be better served with a Disqus page, since the posters are mostly interested in the website itself (but this doesn't allow side announcements, like the making a Live Action.

I do think Flipside could take stock of inactive sections and possibly wipe them in favor of a cleaner forum with only a few sections.

Argh, let's all stare blankly in shock while the heroic dude gets blindsided again. Because that hasn't happened before (ahem, Buzz, Moby herself, Crest, pretty much everyone but Regina for some reason, Mary who would just regenerate, and Melter who is kinda a freak anyway). Oh you could, you know use some sort of teamwork? Nahhhh.

@Bulma:Oh right the healing sword. If it can counter Death&Decay, a stoner surely is no problem.Interesting that the skeleton doesn't get healed by it. Now to find out if he's going to heal Moby with it. Hopefully he stabs her in the eye just for the lulz.

I don't understand the tone thing. You mean as in inevitable peril? Because for me the tone in phase 3 had a cold finality to it, while the current scene is full of hot action. Also gore.

I actually totally called it. It seemed like that sword is like Sesshomaru's Tenseiga. Heal the living, hurt the undead/demons.

The pervasive despair, I mean. The feeling that we, the viewers are watching something hopeless. Of course, if Phase 3 is any guide, not really the case.

The action is more active, yeah, but the whole deal where super-cool stuff happens, but nope, fails. Buzz and Glyph being all heroic are two good examples. Then it was Melter actually losing grip. Crest is the first guy so far that succeeded in doing something awesome with nothing poking out and impaling him... (here's hoping that thought isn't interrupted)

Might wanna try starting small. Do a Book 0 and try the main only once you're further along with the series so as not to go into sidetrack hell.

Depending on whether you decide on live action of anime style, the aesthetic is a big thing. Honestly, the latter, I can see more of a 80s/90s vibe while the live action is more like Game of Thrones (but I imagine your budget isn't enough to do convincing scenery and effects for live action). I remember some of your settings being over-the-top especially some of your cities.

The question is, does Crest wanna talk to her and try to cheer her up,

Wait, that's still an option?

I know she went all "stony faced", but there's a good chance she can still see and hear. The sword itself may also have an impact. We do see Crest reaching for it a few scenes earlier. The tone of this is sorta like 3rd phase of Dark Cell but for us and for most of a chapter though. Here's hope someone does something.

Why all the hate for Moby? I think if she survives, {which I truly do hope so} she is going to likely have a psychological break down!

We all have people we like and don't like. Human nature is not impartial, as much as we might want it.

I don't like Moby cuz she's all homewrecker for the cute Crest/Suspiria thing going on (cute sweater scene OR rapey date), cuz she was a real (w)itch to someone who had serious issues with being teased in school, the whole misusing her magic to forcibly restrain and strip Crest, and her tailoring designs for May just sucked.

I'm seconding SirBananaPie's bet. As strong as my hate for her is even still, she's suffered enough (except for trauma). Regina is a Book 0 character, and Crest is early arc Book 1. Although Brion COULD kill those two off, the impact to the story would be so great as to turn most people off Flipside. Plus, she hasn't really stepped into her role yet so she's kinda still kinda a copycat of May. Melter and Mary are basically our remaining links to the Thin Man. Although an earlier arc DID say Mary dies tragically at some point. Maybe she dies saving the rest?

May's hand that got regrown, was done by "mirroring". But what about Glyph's legs (and whatever else got gobbled by the Pit)? If he does survive, he'll be a complete wreck. I'm not sure they'll be able to regrow what he's got, so they'd have to do a Six Million Dollar Man thing on this guy just to get him to walk right.

If I had to say, I'd say it's mostly her depression. She wants to kill herself and pretty sure her friends are untrustworthy now.

Remember, the number is 1-800-273-8255.

In term of what seem like the natural defenses of the pit, probably turning from flat ground into a pit (usually enough to make most people fall to their doom), eating artifacts, and priestmonster that keeps coming back. The whole spikes popping out of the wall, the fell of rising tide, that the guy was able to pop up from nowhere and eat the stretcher bed, the skeletons, and the blender probably not.

For one, some of these things contradict certain things. For instance, if you have a blender, you probably don't have skeletons, since the blender grinds stuff up. And it seemed like the pit was more a darkness that swallowed stuff up, not a grindinv machine. It was more about negativity and not supposed to be about punishment. And then there's the clear contradiction of the wall spike being active while the music was melting some faces. That pretty much reveals a second force immune to the music.

The question is, does Crest wanna talk to her and try to cheer her up, or is Melter wrong about it being a bad idea to put her in the pit and things will be better off without her?